


The Road Home

by Butyoucancallmemeg



Series: Things We Lose [2]
Category: Leverage, The Librarians (TV 2014)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Canon Divergence, Alternate Universe - Twins, Character-Driven Narratives, Crossover, Light Polyamory, Multi, Team as Family, don't let the plot fool u this is a fic abt my ot3 running a restaurant together
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-21
Updated: 2018-08-20
Packaged: 2019-06-30 12:08:10
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 4,943
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15751365
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Butyoucancallmemeg/pseuds/Butyoucancallmemeg
Summary: Hardison is perched on the counter, long legs dangling down by the cupboard where Eliot and Cain (the ever-gracious head chef) keep the saucepans. One hand is braced just behind him to support his weight as he leans back just slightly. His eyes are on Eliot, tracking his movement with a contemplative look on his face, brow lightly furrowed and mouth drawn. He’s uncharacteristically still - but Parker supposes that makes sense. Eliot is uncharacteristically jittery. It’s balance.





	The Road Home

**Author's Note:**

> Sorry that u don't get to know what happens right after the end of the last one. I like to think that it's the Sisyphus the Hamster of endings - Everything and Nothing happens. But this is some stuff that definitely happens at some point after, and I hope you'll enjoy it. 
> 
> Also, if you came here looking for Quality Librarians Content, I'm sorry. It's a very Leverage-heavy crossover.

 

They are, without a doubt, the most bizarre team of thieves that Parker has ever encountered. She stands just inside the swing doors of the brewpub kitchen, squinting at them through the window in the door. Ezekiel and his team are gathered around a table set for eight. The soldier, Eve, has positioned herself so she can see both the exit and the kitchen door with a quick glance, but she isn’t looking in either direction. The three others are facing her on the opposite side, Ezekiel and the redhead flanking Eliot’s brother like an emotional buffer. With Eve’s hair in that severe bun, and the other three so clearly her junior, it looks more like a teacher meeting with her students than a team of equals. They’re all leaning toward each other, speaking in low tones.  

“She’s the Nate.” Parker announces, turning around to face her boys. 

Eliot is pacing the kitchen, more visibly distraught than she’s ever seen him. He hasn’t even told Hardison off for sitting on the stainless steel counters “where we cook the damn food, Hardison. It’s a health code violation, and it’s nasty.” 

Neither of them really seemed to notice that she spoke.

She takes the little spike of worry that comes from Eliot not being aware of his surroundings, and she tucks it into the space behind her left ear to examine later. Now, she considers them both. 

Hardison is perched on the counter, long legs dangling down by the cupboard where Eliot and Cain (the ever-gracious head chef) keep the saucepans. One hand is braced just behind him to support his weight as he leans back just slightly. His eyes are on Eliot, tracking his movement with a contemplative look on his face, brow lightly furrowed and mouth drawn. He’s uncharacteristically still - but Parker supposes that makes sense. Eliot is uncharacteristically jittery. It’s balance.

When Parker’s limbs are itchy and her thoughts go fast, like when she’s been in one place for too long or there’s too many people in the bar or she doesn’t have a clear line of escape, Hardison gets all still and calm and talks low to her until she’s normal again. And he takes her upstairs and lets her sit on the opposite side of the couch and doesn’t touch her until she scooches into his side. And he says, “alright?” and sometimes she nods and sometimes she shakes her head and sometimes she just burrows into his arm a little bit more and he holds her until she’s ready. Maybe they should do that for Eliot.

She wonders what side of the couch Eliot wants to sit on. Hopefully it’s in the middle. 

Hardison seems to sense her looking at him, and turns to her. His body is still pointing toward Eliot, but his face clears as he looks at her.

“Who is?” he asks conversationally, as if seconds of silence haven’t passed. 

“Soldier lady. Eve.” 

He glances past her to the swing doors, even though he’s not sitting in a very good position for spying. “Nobody’s as good as Nate.” He says, but doesn’t exactly disagree with her. Parker rolls her eyes.

“Well, yeah, but everybody’s  _ got  _ a Nate.”

Eliot stops walking around.

He straightens himself up once he’s standing still, opens his palms at his sides and lets his stance widen out, looks between them a little bit dazed. 

“Not everyone’s got a Nate, Parker.” He says, and maybe he wasn’t as unaware of his surroundings as she thought he was. “Every team’s different. There’s - there’s dynamic and skill set and it depends on the time frame and how big the job is.” He runs his hand through his hair, “It’s more complicated than that.” 

He sounds like he’s becoming more invested in what he’s saying for every word he speaks, and by the end he’s back to his usual level of bluster.

“That team with Kaos and Valentine had a Nate,” Parker reasons, “And a Hardison and an Eliot and a Sophie!”

“And a Parker,” Hardison adds, a little smirk on his face. Parker frowns. 

“Yeah, I guess,” she allows generously, “But he wasn’t as good as me.”

“Their Eliot wasn’t as good as our Eliot either,” Hardison says. Eliot turns to him.

“She was a good fighter,” Eliot protests, “A damn good one. I never beat her.” 

Hardison gives him a long, steady, inscrutable look. “S’not what I meant.” 

Eliot looks unbalanced for a second, then looks at Parker, who just shrugs her agreement. Eliot’s not just a fighter, he does lots of things. He keeps them safe. And he catches her when she jumps off things, even when she doesn’t warn him first. And he cooks for them sometimes, in the kitchen of the pub or in Hardison’s apartment, and he sings old country songs under his breath as he chops things and everything he makes tastes like warm blankets and comfy couches. He opens his mouth to say something, then looks past Parker instead to look at the swing doors - even though  _ he’s _ not at a good spying angle either, and can’t even see the team behind them. Silly.

“Why’d you bring them here?” He asks frustratedly, instead of whatever he was going to say first. 

Hardison shrugs, “You were gonna want some space to cook and figure out ya shit,” He explains easily, shrugging his shoulders, “And now he knows where to find you.” 

“You want me to cook for seven people?” Eliot demands, even though Hardison’s right. Hardison seems to know this too, because he doesn’t even pretend to be sorry for a second.

“I texted Jess, let her know to be on call, promised her a nice bonus. She’s five minutes out if you need a hand. And I know how to chop.” 

Eliot’s already composing things in his head, Parker can tell. He gets that look in his eye, and he skates his eyes over the clean countertops like she does when she scopes out a vault. After a moment, he sighs, and Hardison pretends he’s stifling his smile, but isn’t really at all. 

“Go out there an’ - an’ talk to em or something, make sure nobody’s got any allergies. An’ tell Jess I need buttermilk ‘fore she comes in.”

Hardison hops off the counter obligingly, lifting his phone to his ear. Parker watches as Eliot sets to work, unlocking the walk-in to pull out chicken and greens. 

“And cornmeal!” he calls over his shoulder. Hardison grins into his phone.

-

Jess flies in through the loading door in a sundress. Her keys are in one hand, the other is tightly gripping her hair at the top of her head, and the neck of an apron is between her teeth. A grocery bag hangs off one elbow. She throws her keys to the side and slides her little black purse off her shoulder, spilling lipsticks haphazardly on the counter. She ignores them, twisting her long black hair up expertly into a bun at the top of her head without breaking stride. She looks good, like she was out - which makes sense, it’s late, and the weekend - a face full of makeup and gold highlight on her cheeks.

“That was fast,” Eliot says, turning away from mixing seasonings, “You speed?” He asks disapprovingly. She grins sunnily back at him as she ties her apron strings. 

“No, chef.” She lies, adopting a faux-serious expression. Her eyes are full of mischief. He rolls his eyes. 

“No respect,” Eliot grumbles, turning back to his chicken. Then, over his shoulder, “Hat or headband - and wash your hands.” 

“What am I, new?” Jess gripes. She pulls a light pink beanie out of her purse without putting anything that fell out back into it, and tugs it over her head, then turns on the sink. 

“TBH, you saved my life,” She says conversationally, “Some twink at Treks thought I was a drag queen, told me to take it as a compliment, and kept hitting on me anyways. Swear to god, I was halfway to punching him when I got the call, and he probably would’ve snapped in half. Your girl’s really gotta find a lesbian bar.”

Eliot stifles the smile that starts to form in spite of everything, and moves over to the grocery bag she set on the counter.

He’s spent too long thinking about his conversation with Jake, what he said and what he didn’t say in the hotel. Seeing Jake, talking to him, both set him at ease and set him adrift. Some part of his heart feels mended just knowing that Jake isn’t still stuck in Kentucky on that damn oil rig, that he’s traveling and making something of himself. But there’s so much distance between them now - between the person Jake probably expects him to be and the person he really is. He’s war-roughened, crime-hardened, a lot more broken. He forces himself to be in the present, to feel this food the way he feels the food he makes for Hardison and Parker.

Which is another thing to think about altogether, but he pushes that away too. 

“It’s just cause you’re all -” he makes a vague gesture at his cheeks, “sparkly tonight. Drag queens are sparkly.”  

She snorts. “Know a lot about drag queens, do you chef?” 

He schools his face into something a little smug before turning away to unpack the groceries, flicks his eyebrows at her a little conspiratorially. 

“Make sure you get me the receipt,” he gruffs as he removes the buttermilk, effectively cutting off whatever line of questioning was about to start. 

Jess shrugs, “Alec’s bonusing me out,” She says instead of agreeing. Eliot turns to her, ready to argue, but she says, “You makin’ buttermilk gravy?” 

He narrows his eyes but nods, “Yes, ma’am we are.” 

“Enough for leftovers?” She presses hopefully. 

Her North Carolina twang is comforting, and he thinks she was probably Hardison’s first call - the damn meddler. Hardison hired her on when they first got to Portland, before Eliot’s stubbornness about running the kitchen took a backburner to their day job, and Eliot had had to crash course her in almost every basic culinary skill. What she told him that made him hire her with no experience, he’s not sure, but he knows she showed up at the crack of dawn on Saturdays pro-bono just to learn. She knows her way around the kitchen now, and more than that she knows how to work with him.

“When Cain’s runnin’ this kitchen you’re all ‘yes chef, no chef’,” He grumbles, “Why’s it with me you got attitude?” 

Jess finishes setting up the fryer and steps up next to him, dredges another piece of chicken in flour. She’s taller than him by a mile, taller than Hardison in the heels she’s wearing. She shrugs one shoulder.

“No offense, chef, but Cain’s a lot scarier than you are.” 

He mulls that over for a moment, while Jess pinches his seasoning onto the chicken. 

Cain is a short, round sort of man with a sharp voice and an eye for perfection. He’s got a warm laugh. Hardison privately calls him “Jolly”. He’s not - compared to Eliot, he might as well be Santa Claus. Eliot has the sort of blood on his hands that will never be wiped clean. He stares at Jess - who doesn’t know about any of that, about anything he’s ever done outside this kitchen. 

“You wanna talk about it?” she asks, not looking at him, and he realizes he’s just standing in the middle of the kitchen like an idiot. Goddammit. When did he get easy to read? 

“My brother’s in town,” he could say, “haven’t seen him since I was a kid,” and she’d know, the same way he knows, because she worked Thanksgiving weekend and the week between Christmas and New Year’s with a look in her eye that said she was going home to an empty apartment. He might not be able to tell her about all of it - they have at least some semblance of a cover to keep, after all - but maybe he could tell her about not being the same person that his brother remembers, having done a lot of things differently since the last time they saw each other. She’d probably understand that more clearly than anyone would.

“I’m starting the cornbread,” he says instead, and sets to work.

-

Parker catches Hardison’s gaze as they leave the kitchen, then cuts a glance over to the door of the backroom. He purses his lips a little, but nods, and she sort of almost-flips-her-hair back at him before darting into the back room, silent and graceful as ever, to call Sophie.. He’d tell her not to - they’re on their honeymoon, dammit, they need some peace - but he knows it’s a moot point, because she’d only sneak off to call her somewhere further away - or possibly in the ceiling. 

“If any of y’all’s got allergies, speak now or forever hold your peace,” Hardison says, pulling out the chair at one end of the table. He casts a glance around the table. Eve raises her eyebrows, but looks to her team, who each shakes their head silently. So he sits down, leaning back in the chair and settling in.

“Cool, cuz I know better to get in that man’s way when he’s cooking. An’ his collard greens are better than my nana’s.” 

The rest of the table still doesn’t say anything, just shuffles awkwardly in their seats. Hardison casts his eyes momentarily skyward, praying to whatever the hell agnostic thieves pray to for guidance. 

“Thank you for inviting us here,” the little redhead, Cassandra, says politely, “It’s a lovely place.” 

Hardison nods graciously, “Thanks. I own it, but it’s Eliot who really runs the place. I pretty much just do the books.” 

It’s true, too, Eliot took to the brewpub like a fish to water: tweaking the menu and perfecting the recipes and training up the staff like he was born for it. He grumbled about the work, sometimes, when he was worried he looked too much like he was enjoying it, but Hardison knows him better than to fall for that, and Eliot knows it too.

Jake is looking at him contemplatively, which is making Hardison a little uncomfortable, but he’s not exactly comfortable with anything in this situation, so he just mentally straightens his bowtie. 

“All this on top of your - ah, day job?” Eve asks, curious but still a little guarded. She doesn’t seem to know how to handle him, which he’s sort of enjoying. He gives a humble shrug. 

“Well, you know. We run our  _ consulting  _ company out the back, so we’re here a lot - and the staff knows what to do when we’re out of town on business. There’s a head chef and a waitstaff manager and all that. If Eliot wasn’t so involved in the kitchen I’d say they wouldn’t really need us at all.”

Hardison clocks Parker stepping out of the back room and nods toward an empty chair. She plops gracefully - if such a thing could happen - into the seat across from Ezekiel, and leans on her elbows. 

“I didn’t -” Jake says, then stops and restarts, “I didn’t know Eliot cooks.” He looks lost - has looked a little lost since the second he caught sight of Eliot. A little like he’s holding something very fragile in his hands and couldn’t bear it if it shattered.

And if that doesn’t just break Hardison’s damn heart. He knows Eliot needs a little time to sort himself before he confronts his past, but this man keeps throwing his eyes toward the kitchen door like he thinks maybe Eliot’s snuck out the back, never to be seen again. This kid - and compared to Eliot, who feels so tough and worldly, Jake does feel a little like a kid - isn’t going to look at Eliot and see a monster like Eliot fears. He’s going to see Eliot the same way that Hardison has come to see Parker and Eliot: a second chance at family. 

“When we were kids, he wanted to be a teacher.” Jake admits, soft and sad like a line from a eulogy. Hardison raises his eyebrows, but considers this. Considers the culinary school job, and the job with the kid at the carnival, and every frustrated-but-never-really-angry “dammit Hardison!” 

Considers catching Jess leaving the pub one morning with her hands full of to-go boxes, strolling into the kitchen to find Eliot cleaning the knives. 

“Yeah, y’know? I could see that.” 

Jake seems to settle a little at that, and Hardison mentally claps himself on the back. 

“I mean, there was also a time where we wanted to be firefighting supermans, so -” Jake continues with a half-forced laugh. It does break some tension, and Hardison smiles and says, “Yeah, I can see that too.”

Then Jess pokes her head out of the kitchen and catches his eye, so he slides his chair back and says, “Well, looks like food’s up, so I’ll be right back.” 

-

Hardison slides into the kitchen to find eight perfectly plated meals steaming on the counter: collard greens, fried chicken, cornbread, a little cup of gravy. There’s even a little tiny sprig of parsley resting on each plate. Hardison’s mouth waters at the sight.

“Man, these kids don’t know what’s about to hit ‘em,” He tells Jess, rubbing his palms together appreciatively, “This looks great.”

Eliot stands at the sink, washing his hands, and Hardison catches him stifling a smile - looking much less tense than he did the last time Hardison checked in with him. 

“Kitch isn’t clean,” Jess says, “But I caught a glimpse out there, so I think y’all should leave the cleanup to me - I’ll eat back here before I head out.”

Hardison looks to Eliot, whose mouth twitches but who doesn’t protest, and says with wide earnest eyes, “Jess, you’re my favorite employee.” 

She snorts, slipping her apron off her neck to fold it down waitress-style around her waist. She slides her cap off, too, tosses it onto a counter carelessly.

“Tell it to my bonus, Alec.” Deftly, she lifts two plates onto one arm, slides a hand under the third, and pushes out through the doors. 

“Ten people my ass,” they both hear, before the doors swing shut again. 

Hardison grins. “Made too much so she’d get leftovers?” He asks, because he likes to make sure Eliot knows how transparent he is sometimes.

“You’re the one who told Parker not to feed the stray cats,” He tells Eliot, who does not deign to answer. 

“You get two and I’ll get two,” Eliot says instead, and they head off to face the music.

-

Jess waits until all the plates have been distributed, brushes her hands off on her apron and says with a sweet smile and a turned-up southern-belle lilt, “My name’s Jess if y’all need anything else - just holler.” 

She winks in Eliot’s direction before flying back into the kitchen. Parker has settled into the seat across from Ezekiel, next to Eve. Eliot heard some of their history - if only just that they had one, which is all that he really needs to hear. If Parker’s given him a stamp of approval, then that’s enough. She has an eye for these sorts of things. However, it left Eliot to decide whether or not to sit at the other head of the table.

He doesn’t, in the end, sliding the chair out on Eve’s other side instead. Jake is there, almost directly in his line of sight, staring at him. Eliot doesn’t set his jaw, but it takes effort. Under the table, Hardison’s knee brushes against his own, silently supportive. 

-

“This is the best food I’ve ever tasted.” Cassandra says appreciatively, gesturing with her fork. Eliot smiles softly, “Well,” He says, “I try. Thank you.”

He catches sight of Cassandra’s elbow pressing into Jake’s upper arm.

“Eliot, This is - you’re a great cook.” Jake says. He looks straight at Eliot as he says it, open and earnest and right there. Eliot forces himself not to look away.

“Means a lot, Jake.” He says, holding Jake’s gaze. Jake smiles a little before breaking it. That smile feels like bridges being mended - or how Eliot had always imagined it might feel like.

“You’re kind of weird for a group of thieves,” Parker remarks, about halfway through a meal that’s awkward, yes, but not nearly as awkward as it should be, given the circumstances. Eliot catches Hardison wince. 

“We’re not thieves,” Jake cuts in, defensive. Parker and Ezekiel, sitting face to face across from each other, frown in eerie unison. 

“Hey, I’m a thief,” Ezekiel argues, mildly affronted. A familiar long-suffering expression flits across Jake’s face - the same one Eliot gets when Hardison sits on the counters, or pretends microwaved food is just as good as real food.  

“ _ We _ aren’t thieves,” he amends with some frustration, drawing a triangle with his finger between Eve, Cassandra, and himself. Eliot casts his eyes over Cassandra, who is, from what he’s seen, a ball of excitement and sunshine, and thin as a rail. He won’t underestimate her, because she’s smart as a whip and he knows better, but he can hardly see her as a criminal. 

“You were  _ stealing  _ something,” Parker points out, as if maybe Jake is a little slow. “That’s theft.” 

Jake takes a moment, momentarily mollified as he realizes he can’t argue.

“It’s okay,” Parker continues, still matter-of-fact, “We’re thieves too, we’re not judging.” 

Hardison coughs hard at that, glancing over at Baird. Jake blinks, casting his eyes over to Eliot.

“Allegedly,” Eliot amends, looking at the table. He can’t meet Jake’s eyes. 

“If y’all aren’t thieves, what exactly do you do?” Hardison asks - a valid question. In all his time thinking about how confrontation between him and Jake would go, Eliot managed to glaze over what exactly Parker found him doing in the first place. 

“We’re librarians!” Cassandra says cheerfully - or maybe that’s just her voice, he can’t quite tell yet. It’s inexplicably endearing.

“Librarians who steal things?” Eliot clarifies, skeptical. Next to him, he’s pretty sure he can feel Eve’s wince. 

Jake splays a hand out face down on the table, “We’re - archivists,” he says, sort of haltingly. How Hardison sounds when he’s trying to dumb something down to terms that a normal person can understand. 

“We collect like, old books and artifacts for special collections,” Ezekiel adds, “Sometimes they’re hard to get to, and sometimes they fall into the wrong hands, and we have to…” He sort of shrugs, “Get them back. By any means necessary.” 

“By stealing.” Parker surmises. 

“Not all the time!” Cassandra protests. Parker gives her a conspiratorial nod and winks, “Right.” 

“So y’all are, what? Indiana Jones: the Dream Team?” Hardison jokes. The three librarians on his right just glance nervously at each other. 

“Well, alright.” Hardison says, leaning back in his chair, “An’ I thought our job was cool.”

“I don’t know if I would call Career Criminals ‘cool’,” Eve says. When Eliot cuts a glance to her, she’s actually looking at Ezekiel.

“Ay man,” Hardison protests, “We’re the good guys. Corrupt Billionaires, that’s what  _ we  _ do. Y’all remember Wakefield Incorporated?”

Ezekiel gives him a blank look, but Jake and Cassandra both raise their eyebrows. Cassandra jumps on it first. Beside him, Hardison feels Eliot tense up, hackles rising like a startled cat.

“Someone threatened to murder a journalist on camera during a Hazmat evacuation.”

“She was trying to start a famine or something. It was national news,” Jake adds, casting his eyes around the table.

Hardison grins and nods, “On tape and everything,” he gloats, “Some of our finest work.”

“Hardison…” Eliot growls, a light warning. Hardison bumps his knee reassuringly, then says, “We beat a Steranko, baby! In two hours. A man can’t brag?” 

This brings Ezekiel right back into the conversation. 

“A Steranko?” He demands, looking - Hardison might even call it flabbergasted, “There’s no way. Not in two  _ months  _ let alone two hours.” He looks around the table again, then after a moment, zeroes in on Hardison. 

“Alec Hardison.” He says, after a long moment. “Like,  _ Alec. Hardison _ .”

Hardison preens, throwing his hands behind his head. Eliot kicks him in the shin. 

“You’re all Nate Ford’s crew.” Ezekiel says, casting his eyes around the table. He’s halfway between bewildered and star-struck. 

Hardison gives a faux-modest nod. Privately, he loves the notoriety that their team has now, among the criminal element. The fewer people knowing who they work with, the better, and Hardison scrubs the web for their names every chance he gets. Rumors are rumors, though, and these days the rumors about Nate Ford and his crew read a little like ghost stories. 

Across the table, Cassandra raises a tentative hand. 

“What exactly is a Steranko?” she questions. Hardison and Ezekiel both make motions to answer, but it’s Eve that speaks first.

“It’s an artificially intelligent security system. I’ve read files on it. Works like a chinese finger trap: easy to get in, impossible to get out.” 

“Jim Steranko was an escape artist in the fifties. He drew comics for a while. Guess that’s where the name came from.” Surprisingly, it’s Jake who pipes up with this tidbit. He’s been quiet a while, letting the conversation move around him with a contemplative expression. Every time he learns something new about Eliot, though, a little sliver of something peeks through his eyes.   

Hardison’s brow flits up in delighted surprise, “The man knows comics!” he says appreciatively. “Maybe ‘I-don’t-own-a-tv’ over here could stand to learn something from you,” He says, throwing a hand around the back of Eliot’s chair. Eliot’s shoulders settle a little at the contact - something Hardison must notice, because the weight of his arm becomes a little more pointed. He adjusts his chair subtly to make the angle more natural. 

“Used to read comics when we were little,” Eliot says, a little haltingly. “Never was as into it as Jake was, though.” 

Hardison’s never heard much about Eliot’s childhood - it’s off-limits in the way all of their childhoods are, to some degree. But he watches as Eliot holds out this little piece of his shared past with Jake. An olive branch, maybe. Jake’s eyes are glued to Eliot, latching onto it with a white-knuckled fist, not daring to let go.

“You only ever read Captain America,” Jake says with a small smile, “A little bit of X-Men, too. Used to walk to the comic shop with me and let me use part of his allowance to pay for new issues and tell me he’d read them after I was done but he never did.” He reminisces. There’s no bitterness in his voice, just fond nostalgia. 

Hardison sees Eliot’s lower lip twitch. Feels him shake when he exhales. When he speaks, his voice is heavy, but sure.

“We got a lot to talk about, Brother.”

He tilts his head toward the front door of the brewpub, standing. Jake follows him into the dark.

\- 

They walk, and they keep walking. It’s easier not to look at him. A block passes beneath their feet before Eliot says anything.

“I wasn’t a good man,” He tells the air in front of him. Jake waits him out, his footfalls steady beside Eliot’s. 

“Wasn’t always pulling Robin Hoods. I did… bad things for bad people. To bad ends.” His voice is rough and he’s fighting the words even as they leave his mouth. Can’t look up at Jake to see his face.

“Rather have you thinkin’ I died a hero than knowing I got -” He cuts himself off. Stops walking. When he turns, Jake’s eyes are staring back at him. 

“I got blood on my hands, Jake. The kind that don’t come off.” 

Jake’s hand lands firm and sure on Eliot’s shoulder.

“I know the kind of man you are, Eliot.” He says, earnest and honest and too kind to bear. “You’re still my brother.”

Eliot shakes his head, thins his lips, “Jake…”

“You protect them, don’t you?” Jake asks over him, with a half-glance back toward the bar. 

Eliot lets his shoulders fall. “With my life,” He says, plaintive. Hardison and Parker, they’re his family. Not in the same way Jake is his family, but it runs just as deep. Just as strong and true. 

Jake nods, brows going up like Eliot’s just conceded a point.

“Same as you did with me.” 

“But I left you!” Eliot bursts, stepping close and speaking fervently. “I left you to - to fend for yourself. I left you with him, and all that responsibility. I  _ stopped  _ protecting you, Jake.”

Eliot’s hand is on Jake’s shoulder. The tremble of his lower lip is hopefully not visible in the darkness. Jake holds his gaze, steady as the sun. 

“You taught me how to protect myself, Eliot. I got out all on my own.”

Eliot’s head falls like his strings have been cut, and Jake reaches out, pulls him into a hug that lands Eliot’s head on his shoulder. He doesn’t relax, but he lets himself be moved.

“You never forgave yourself, Eliot.” He says, irreverent but matter-of-fact. “That’s part of how I know you’re the same self-flagellating bastard you were at eighteen.”

Eliot huffs a laugh, rights himself. Straightens his shirt out. 

“And you’re still pulling words like ‘self-flagellating’ out your ass like you’re Encyclopedia Brown.”

Jake elbows him, cracking a smile. Both men, no longer the boys they once were together, turn to continue ambling along the Portland city streets. They hadn’t aired all their issues, shared their trials and triumphs. But this - walking together, side by side? It was enough.

  
  
  
  
  


**Author's Note:**

> I slip in and out of everyone’s heads a lot in this but I tried to keep it a little bit characterized - Parker thinks about her emotions very abstractly, has unorthodox priorities, misinterprets some interpersonal cues. Eliot compartmentalizes, but like. Isn’t that good at it? And - Jess is trans (if you caught that) because it’s thematically relevant for her to be literally a different person than her family knows but also because sometimes a bitch just has to write the representation she wants to see in the world, u feel? 
> 
> Catch me at Lesbionicteenagewarhead on tumblr


End file.
